In the days leading up to my 44th birthday – and clutching a brand new prescription for reading glasses – I was feeling old. How soon would it be before I took up gardening, I wondered. Would I suddenly develop a keen interest in needlepoint and talkback radio?
My friend, who is a solid decade older than me, insisted wallowing in self-pity was not an option. “Put on your sequins, woman; we’re going dancing,” she instructed.
There are no shortages of studies that show a link between dancing and an elevated mood. Researchers from , for example, found that enjoying the old ‘sprinkler’ or even an embarrassed side step in synchronicity with others provides powerful bursts of endorphins, making us not only feel happier but more connected with others.
Certainly, in my darkest days during the lockdowns of 2020 and 2021, I quickly discovered that nothing improved my mood quite like an impromptu kitchen disco (I even purchased disco balls and strobe lighting online to make the space look like a nightclub – albeit one with a fridge, oven and two slack-jawed children wondering what on earth was happening with their mum).
… nothing improved my mood quite like an impromptu kitchen disco
On my birthday, the DJ at that particular venue, did not want to partake in my dance floor joy. Knocking back my repeated requests for New Order (see 44), he spun Aqua’s Barbie Girl with reckless abandon and eventually I got into the swing with my effervescent running man/robot/Vogue movements. Can I kick it? Believe me, nobody jumps as high as this middle-aged lass when House of Pain comes on – nobody.
As I spun around under the gargantuan disco ball with my friend, our smiles growing wider and wider, I felt my body grow lighter and my head become giddier. In our minds we were 20 again – until my friend pointed out the actual 20-year-olds dancing with far less enthusiasm beside us. “I don’t know why we put so much thought into our outfits,” she shouted in my ear over the familiar ‘la la la’ of Our Kylie’s Can’t Get You Out of My Head. “They’re all dressed like they were on their way to grab some milk from the supermarket but decided to pop in for an impromptu dance.” A quick look around revealed an abundance of tracksuit pants and a crop top or T-shirt.
The clothing choice isn’t what struck me, however. It was the difference in the levels of joy we were radiating. The older dancers – those in their 40s and beyond – were dancing like they’d spent the last 20 years locked in a cage and were keen to unleash the beast within. There was no concern about how they looked; they were only really interested in being in the moment.
All the realities of hardcore adulting in 2022 could wait until the kids start bouncing on the bed at the crack of dawn. We know enough to know to seize our moments of joy wherever and whenever we find them (thank you, new reading glasses).
I’d never felt happier to embrace my age
The younger dancers were more restricted with their movements, self-consciously swaying with their friends, tugging on their clothes and stopping every so often to take photos and videos of the action. They were the movements of those who don’t yet know of all the beauty – and the hardships – that are around the corner.
When you’re 18, you don’t know how much something as seemingly small and insignificant as dancing with a friend on a Friday night can mean. One girl, dancing with a bottle of wine in one hand and a glass of white in the other, drunkenly threw her arm around me, did the splits (literally) and cried about the boy who dumped her and the friend that left her to dance alone.
And just like that, two things became clear to me. The first was the fact that I’d never felt happier to embrace my age. Sure, my list of health/family/societal concerns is as long as this piece, but hey, I was equipped with all the things that made for a fantastic night out – great food, comfortable dancing shoes and a beautiful friend who would never leave me to dance on my own. I’m old enough to know that this – along with an uncanny ability to be really present in a moment – is what’s important in life. Downer alert: I’m also old enough to know that this could all end tomorrow and I want to take advantage of all of it right now.
The second thing? If you’re ever feeling sad, there’s just no better place to be than on a dance floor with some middle-aged women squeezing the juice out of every freakin’ disco-tracked moment. They might keep approaching the DJ with requests for New Order, but with everything else they’re going through (raising a household of teenagers while negotiating a pandemic, menopause etc.), they bloody well deserve a round of Blue Monday.
